


Watching Fate as it Flows

by spaceleviathan



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-31
Updated: 2012-12-31
Packaged: 2017-11-23 01:23:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/616516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceleviathan/pseuds/spaceleviathan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lying on the beach, Charles can only watch as his life slips away from his control.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Watching Fate as it Flows

**Author's Note:**

  * For [swoopswoop](https://archiveofourown.org/users/swoopswoop/gifts).



> Very much inspired by swoopswoop's 'In This Together'. In fact, this was written precisely BECAUSE of that fic.

“We’re brothers you and I,” Erik gasped, close to Charles' face and pleading.

Looking up at the helpless man above him, Charles could hardly speak. He was in searing agony, from the bullet in his spine, to the risk he ran of losing _everything_. In that moment, he could see so much more than the here and now, so much more than the conflicting and confusing thoughts of everyone around him. Before him stretched on the future - his life, Erik's life, Raven's life, and the life of every mutant upon this planet. He couldn't speak, because what he'd eventually say would shift the balance of everything.

Erik stared down at him unblinkingly, eyes searching Charles' own, hands tight around Charles' body. _Please_ , he was thinking. _Please, Charles_.

Please what, Erik? Charles wanted to ask him, but he knew how the mutant answer. Leave with him, lead a life with him, change the world with him. Erik truly believed together they would be unstoppable - just look at what they did today!

What they did was make a godawful mess of all they'd worked for. The humans weren't ready for mutants to make an appearance; not in this tentative age where everything was stuck in static, caught between the time of yesteryear and the dawning, frightening new age. Mutants now would aggravate an already tense situation. Mutants would be the pushing force behind an army of humans just itching to find a reason to end this unsure time between yesterday and tomorrow.

Furthermore, _mutants_ weren't ready to be thrust so unthinkingly into the public eye. Whilst there were some like Charles and Erik who were of a mature age who had already seen the world, most were like Hank and Sean and Raven; much too young and much too immature. More and more mutants were born every year, but they were still only children. One day their time would come, but today was not that day.

Today had been unwise. Necessary, of course, for stopping a third world war happening in the same fifty-year period, but foolish. If Erik hadn't been there, the only one who'd have stood a chance at surviving would have been Shaw's red-skinned teleporter. They had been ill-prepared, unsafe, and if mutants came to light, god only knows the tragedy of what would follow.

But then there was Erik, who still watched Charles with such hope that Charles was considering everything Erik said twice over. The humans _had_ made the first move - shooting at them, despite the fact the mutants had been the ones to save their skins - and they had shown no pity. Charles had felt it when he had pressed against their minds upon some vain hope of finding something other than all that Erik so cynically expected. Charles, as he had lowered his hand and nodded his head towards Moira, had never felt so naive as he had done in that moment.

The over-arching emotion in those humans' minds had been fear. Fear for what they'd seen as a submarine rose out of the great depths of the sea, fear for the alien-like craft zooming in to the rescue. Fear of _them._ Fear of _Erik_.

Certainly, Charles had felt furious, indignant and horrified at the brisk way the humans had written them off as naught but a circus act of dangerous freaks, but that didn't mean that Charles was about to let Erik kill them.

He'd paid for his sins, he supposed. Perhaps it was karma: Charles protected the wrong species, and was shot in the back for it.

He met Erik's eyes, vivid in the overhanging sun, reflected so beautifully against the white sand, and Charles could clearly what would happen to them both, to them all, should he say no.

Erik would leave, likely with his pick of the mutants left on this beach with him, Raven included, and slowly each group would alienate themselves from each other. One day, when mutants were ready to immerge and Charles was willing to go through it all over again with his own followers at his back, he would meet Erik again, but it wouldn't be the Erik he knew: it would be the man who'd sent hundreds of missiles hurtling towards innocent men without a second thought; the same man who twisted a coun through another human's skull. Charles would see this mutant who had very separate beliefs, and their eyes would meet for the first time in god knows how many years from across a battlefield.

They would cause deaths, destruction, chaos. Ultimately, they would end each other. Charles would, of course, never go a day without thinking of Erik, nor mourning the man as if he'd already died, and he hoped (though he didn't hold his breath) that Erik would do the same for him.

Charles would cling on desperately to the sob his friend had held in his voice when he had first taken Charles' bleeding form into his arms, when he'd whispered, _I'm so sorry, Charles_. He would believe everyday that, deep down, his friend was still within his skin, trapped beneath his helmet and his history.

Charles would go to his death having spent every second of his life praying for Erik to come home.

Then, Charles thought about what would happen if he said yes to the metal bender. What life would be like if he accepted Erik's offer.

He'd likely lose one or two of the boys - most likely Alex. Alex did truly believe that humans and mutants could cohabit the earth, and was more than used to being on his own should anyone disagree with him. He would shun Charles for changing his mind, and then walk away forever.

Erik would insist that they not return to the mansion, as it was under Charles' name. Moira would be cast out, and Charles would have to wipe her mind simply to stop Erik from digging the bullet she'd cast into Charles' back through her forehead.

They'd live and fight and travel and train, gathering up new mutants like building an army, recruiting and scrounging for only those old enough to join the cause, only those with nothing to lose. They'd rise up as a force to be reckoned with, they'd become recognised, and the humans would hate them.

One of them would have to cave to the other, because like it or not there was no compromise. They could pretend there was, of course, and perhaps at the beginning there even would be, but there was no room for moderation within Erik's bones, and neither in Charles'. A quality they shared, which annoyed their newly adopted children more than anything else, was their sheer pigheadedness.

Charles would say, _don't kill the humans_ , so Erik wouldn't kill the humans. Erik would make it so it would have been a mercy for him to have killed them. He'd make Charles feel guilty, and that in turn would make Erik feel guilty once he realised what he'd done.

Erik would say, _we have to use force_ , so Charles would use as little as possible, and even then, only after he'd tried talking their opposition round. Erik would then get so wound up, their group would consider it a miracle one of them hadn't slaughtered the other in the night.

Yes, their relationship would grow stronger, at least initially. They'd be forced to live together, to further understand each other, to _know_ one another. Charles would likely fall in love with Erik all over again as their lives co-mingled to such a point that neither could recognise who'd been born in Westchester, and who in Germany.

But then cracks would start to appear, and Raven would get increasingly concerned about how often they bickered, and maybe one day they'd end up hurting each other or one of their own through their inability to agree whilst in a combat situation. They'd lose someone, be that a fellow mutant or one of themselves, and they would be ridden to such grief that there would be no capacity to heal.

They'd destroy themselves, and they'd destroy the ones around them. Their path for vengeance would spark a pre-emptive war, just as Shaw had wanted, and perhaps the mutants would win in the end, but perhaps not. If either Charles or Erik would live to see the end, there would only be one of them around. They were far too different for them to survive together.

Either way, they'd destroy the world, ripping themselves to pieces in the meantime. Charles, stuck on a beach bleeding out in his best friend's arms, had to decide which one would make the inevitable easier for both of them.

“We want the same thing," Erik insisted, shaking the telepath's shoulders minutely. He was so very careful not to hurt Charles, and he gripped at Charles' heart as the blasted organ rebelled against the professor's order to stay strong.

"Oh, my friend," he breathed. Perhaps he was crying, but he was too numb to tell. He ran his eyes over Erik's features, as if this was the last time he'd ever see this dear, dear, tragic man. And perhaps it would be. 

Erik waited, baited breath for an answer, and this was all Charles could give him:

"I'm sorry."


End file.
